It so befell, in this King Arthur’s reign,
  A lusty knight was pricking o’er the plain;
  A bachelor he was, and of the courtly train. 
  It happen’d, as he rode, a damsel gay,
  In russet robes, to market took her way. 50
  Soon on the girl he cast an amorous eye,
  So straight she walk’d, and on her pasterns high: 
  If, seeing her behind, he liked her pace,
  Now turning short, he better likes her face. 
  He lights in haste, and, full of youthful fire,
  By force accomplish’d his obscene desire: 
  This done, away he rode, not unespied,
  For swarming at his back the country cried: 
  And once in view they never lost the sight,
  But seized, and pinion’d brought to court the knight, 60

    Then courts of kings were held in high renown,
  Ere made the common brothels of the town: 
  There, virgins honourable vows received,
  But chaste as maids in monasteries lived: 
  The king himself, to nuptial ties a slave,
  No bad example to his poets gave: 
  And they, not bad, but in a vicious age,
  Had not, to please the prince, debauch’d the stage.

    Now, what should Arthur do?  He loved the knight,
  But sovereign monarchs are the source of right:  70
  Moved by the damsel’s tears and common cry,
  He doom’d the brutal ravisher to die. 
  But fair Geneura rose in his defence,
  And pray’d so hard for mercy from the prince,
  That to his queen the king the offender gave,
  And left it in her power to kill or save: 
  This gracious act the ladies all approve,
  Who thought it much a man should die for love;
  And with their mistress join’d in close debate,
  (Covering their kindness with dissembled hate) 80
  If not to free him, to prolong his fate. 
  At last agreed, they call him by consent
  Before the queen and female parliament;
  And the fair speaker, rising from the chair,
  Did thus the judgment of the house declare: 

    Sir knight, though I have ask’d thy life, yet still
  Thy destiny depends upon my will: 
  Nor hast thou other surety than the grace
  Not due to thee from our offended race. 
  But as our kind is of a softer mould, 90
  And cannot blood without a sigh behold,
  I grant thee life; reserving still the power
  To take the forfeit when I see my hour: 
  Unless thy answer to my next demand
  Shall set thee free from our avenging hand. 
  The question, whose solution I require,
  Is, What the sex of women most desire? 
  In this dispute thy judges are at strife;
  Beware; for on thy wit depends thy life. 
  Yet (lest surprised, unknowing what to say, 100
  Thou damn thyself) we give thee farther day: 
  A year is thine to wander at thy will,